Wilde Forever (Wilde Women Book 1) Read online

  Turning toward the very pretty woman behind the counter greeting him with a bright smile, Jax shoved his sunglasses into an inside pocket of his leather jacket and walked in her direction, his mind taking in a thousand small bits of information about the craftsmanship, on which no detail had been spared. Oh yeah, and the baked goods scattered around were making his stomach sit up and take notice. But that wasn’t why he was here.

  “G’Morning,” he said politely. “Cinnamon rolls are the devil’s handiwork, y’know,” he told her with a straight face. The woman’s eyes lit up, and she laughed out loud at his remark.

  “What?” she chuckled, with a confused snicker.

  “Many a man has been lured to his doom by a gooey roll and its promise of heavenly delight.”

  The woman had a good sense of humor and played along with a sly smile. “Ah, I see you’ve heard about our sinful buns.”

  Jax had to laugh at her cheeky comeback. Sinful buns, indeed.

  “I’m taking your comment to mean that you’d really like a taste. Of a sample, I mean.” She looked at him with a tongue-in-cheek innocence that made him smile. Catching sight of her gleaming wedding ring he mentally checked himself and silently applauded the man who’d been lucky enough to land the pleasant woman. This was another thing he’d found likeable about being so far from the city. The women in these towns were less artificial and had a down-to-earth charm he found easy on the nerves.

  “You wouldn’t by any chance be the proprietor of this place would you?” Enough flirting, even if it was casual and harmless. Time to think about business.

  She laughed and shook her head furiously. “Oh, God no. I’m hopeless in the kitchen. Drives my husband crazy! I’m Amy by the way and from seven to three every day, I run the bakery and manage the tearoom.”

  Jax stepped closer and shook the hand she offered over the counter, aware the entire time that she was quite literally checking him out from head to toe.

  Clearing his throat, he nodded, acknowledging the charming establishment and continued, “Nice to meet you Amy. My name is Jax. Jax Merrill. Is the owner around? While I’d love a cinnamon roll, I’m really here to see about a renovation project.”

  He thought that by clearly stating what his business was, he’d be sending a hands-off signal, but that didn’t seem to be the case. When he asked about the owner, Amy flashed a quick expression that looked like she’d just won the damn lottery. He had no idea what was going on in her mind, and it threw him a bit.

  “Oh my goodness!” she chirped excitedly. “You need to speak to the baker then.”

  “I guess so,” he answered with a half roll of his shoulder. “Is he the owner?”

  His grumpy morning suddenly turned interesting when the woman eyeballing him clapped her hands together in glee. “This is awesome,” he heard her mutter. Shit. He hated it when there was a subtext in the air, and he didn’t know what it meant.

  “Would you mind letting him know that I’d like to see him?”

  “Absolutely,” Amy chuckled. “Why don’t you go grab a coffee in the tearoom and I’ll stick my head in the kitchen and announce that you’re here.”

  She vanished in the next breath, having dashed though wide swinging doors before he could react. Just fucking great. He briefly wondered if the owner was the woman’s husband and cringed. Last thing he needed was a wife with a wandering eye and a husband on a leash. Yeah. He needed a coffee. Maybe even a double.

  “Brynn!”

  She startled when she heard her name being called and turned toward the sound.

  “What?” she grumbled at Amy. “I’m busy.” Apparently she wasn’t quite ready to make nice with her assistant and forget about the troubling thoughts weighing down her mind.

  “Well, get unbusy. There’s someone here to see you.”

  Brynn frowned at this news. She didn’t have any appointments scheduled and wasn’t expecting anybody. Bad bloody timing too. In her present frame of mind she was anything but friendly and would have a hard time being businesslike.

  “Hey!” Brynn wailed as Amy whacked her butt with a kitchen towel. “What the hell was that for?”

  “Oh. Sorry boss. My bad. You’ve got flour on your ass. I was just helping get it off.”

  “I’m a baker, Amy. Having flour on my clothes is part of the deal. What’s got your panties in a twist?”

  Brynn’s eyes narrowed when she saw Amy glance at the door to the shop. What the hell was going on? Her assistant had a weird expression that hovered between mischief and total innocence. She had two sisters dammit and wasn’t stupid when it came to female meddling.

  Suddenly, her assistant morphed into a mother figure, pulling off Brynn’s apron and even using the towel to swipe at something on her face. Oh, come on, she thought. What in the world was all this fussing about?

  “I don’t have time for any nonsense Amy so stop with the mother hen routine. Unless you tell me what’s really going on, you can just go send whoever is here to see me on their merry way.”

  The assistant laughed. “Oh, you have time for this nonsense.”

  “Planning on telling me why?”

  The grin coming back her way got even bigger. “Does tall, seriously cute, and dressed all in black qualify as why?”

  Heaving a dramatic sigh, Brynn snarled. “Seriously? You want to drag me out front because of a guy? The customers are your job. I like being in the kitchen, and that’s the way it’s going to stay.” Fuck. Even to her own ears she sounded like a mud-stuck spinster too set in her own ways to indulge in a little fun.

  “Brynn Wilde,” Amy pouted. “You are a pain in the tochus! You know that, right?”

  “Yeah, well …. my tochus is fine the way it is. Stop with the Hello Dolly matchmaking, would you? I do not have time for every hot piece of ass that stops by.”

  “Someday I’m going to make you eat those words, but right now you have a visitor so stuff a sock in the whining. He’s here to see you. Not stop by the bakery for a treat. He mentioned something about the renovation project. Whatever the case, stop yer bitchin’ lady and get out there!”

  Slamming her hands on her waist, Brynn growled and stomped a foot. Anything else, she wondered. At the moment all she could concentrate on was her own problems; about the last thing she wanted to deal with was a reminder of the projects she needed done at the house. If some guy was here to see her about the work, that meant she’d have to step away from the kitchen and make nice when losing herself in the baking was all she wanted to do.

  “Fine,” she sniped none too happily. “Why the hell not?” Smoothing her hair into a tight ponytail, Brynn glared at Amy as she brushed herself off. “You’ll have to listen for the timer and pull those challahs out of the oven when it dings. And if this conversation takes more than ten minutes, I expect you to interrupt and give me an out, okay?” When Amy didn’t say anything her temper flared. “I’m dead serious. Ten minutes Amy and then you cut in.”

  Stomping like a sulky toddler, she headed for the door to the shop. “Where is this Mr. Black?”

  Hearing Amy’s throaty laugh rattled Brynn’s nerves. “Oh, you’ll see him right away boss lady. He’s awfully hard to miss. And you might want to have a tissue in your pocket.”

  “For what?” Brynn demanded.

  “For the drool.”

  Oh shit.

  Brynn saw him the instant she cleared the swinging doors into the shop. Amy hadn’t been exaggerating. Even from across the large room she could see that he was quite a head-turner. There was just something about a guy in head-to-toe black that caught a gal’s attention.

  He was tall. She was a solid five seven and a half, and he looked to be at least half a foot and more above her head. Brown hair that reminded her of Nana’s vintage mink coat softened the man in black look, but not by much. The broad shoulders underneath a well-worn leather jacket actually made Brynn catch her breath. He looked like someone you’d run to for comfort in a thunderstorm.

  Wait a mi
nute! What? Run to in a thunderstorm? Good grief. She must be losing her mind with a thought like that. Brynn did not do run to scenarios. That wasn’t who she was. Still, she couldn’t ignore the masculinity that emanated off his body in waves.

  “Um,” Brynn mumbled. “Excuse me,” she said with an unexpected lack of confidence as she addressed the back of the man who had yet to turn around. “Are you looking for me?”

  She’d taken him by surprise, creeping up on him while his back was turned. She could tell by the way his head snapped up as she spoke and the speed with which he spun around. Not only did her confidence flee, when she got a good look at him up close, so did all her active brain cells. He was, in a word, gorgeous. Feeling like an interrogation light was shining in her face, she was frozen by the intensity of the hazel eyes boring into hers. What language did she speak? Brynn couldn’t remember. The sounds buzzing in her brain all sounded like gibberish, and she couldn’t form two consecutive coherent words to save her life.

  They stood there silently staring at each other until she saw him blink several times and shake his head. He looked as stunned as she felt.

  “Are you the owner of the bakery?” the man questioned. His voice, low and deeply masculine, vibrated in her chest.

  Was she? Damn. She couldn’t remember. All she could think about was Amy’s taunt about wiping up her drool once she got a good look at the mystery man in her shop. She hadn’t been kidding.

  Remembering who she was in time to save the encounter from falling apart in an explosion of nerves, she flung her hand out for him to shake in a jerky arc noticing the remnants of flour on her skin too late to do anything about it.

  “Yes I am. My name is Brynn Baron-Wilde, and you are…”

  When he didn’t accept her handshake or say anything, Brynn felt like a complete idiot. “I’m sorry,” she mumbled. “Is there something wrong?”

  She watched as he inhaled and the massive chest beneath his broad shoulders expanded. Drool cup, anyone?

  Responding to her offered handshake in a sort of stunned slow motion, she bit back a gasp when his big, warm hand curled around hers. A bolt of lightning shot up her arm, straight into her neck.

  “No, no. Nothing’s wrong,” he said. “You surprised me, that’s all. I was expecting…or rather, I wasn’t expecting a woman.”

  Brynn instantly bristled at his remark. Just fucking great. Nothing cancelled the drool faster than a condescending chauvinist. Swiftly pulling her hand from his grasp she pursed her lips and stared him down.

  “Well, sorry to disappoint.” Her tone all but spelled out a distinctive fuck you, buddy. “I’m really quite busy so if you’d state your business, I’d appreciate it.” She had gone from intrigued to annoyed in a heartbeat. The asshole hadn’t even told her his name yet.

  She wondered if her displeasure got through to him when he took a step back and looked around the shop at everything except her. After a tense, silent minute he tried a smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes and nodded at her acknowledgment of his lack of manners.

  “Please forgive me Ms. Wilde. I don’t normally eat my own foot but you did take me by surprise. It’s not every day a guy meets a business owner with such, uh … presence.” He punctuated the statement by wiping his hand on his black jeans leaving a faint trail of white from the floury handshake.

  “My name is Jackson Merrill. Please call me Jax. Perhaps your father told you I’d be stopping by?”

  Call him Jax? Not a chance. She detested being made to feel like her gender defined who she was. There was no way she had time for any of this bullshit—whatever it was. “No, he did not Mr. Merrill. As I’ve said, I’m really quite busy…”

  The man in black looked decidedly uncomfortable when she snapped out the terse reply to the question about her father. If he had been sent by her dad, she was going to freak out on her parent for not warning her, and if he hadn’t…well, Jackson, call me Jax, Merrill was going to get the boot in record time.

  “Alright, fair enough,” he answered mildly. “I get that you’re busy but I think we got off on the wrong foot Ms. Wilde. If you’ll just let me explain…”

  Out of the corner of her eye Brynn saw Amy watching their exchange with fascination. She had done a complete one-eighty in the two minutes she’d been standing there talking to the irritating stranger, going from spine tingling awareness to wanting to kick sand in his face and she was pretty sure her assistant had picked up on all of it. Goddammit. Get your shit together Brynn, she silently chanted.

  Leaving her manners by the door, she interrupted him with an imperious snort and the body language of a pissed off dominatrix. If her ass got any tighter, quarters would bounce off it. “Alright Mr. Merrill. Let’s sit over by the window. I could use a short break. Can I get you anything?”

  He smiled, and this time it did reach his eyes. “Your shop assistant promised me a cinnamon roll. I hear you’ve got the best buns around.” Brynn did not miss the slight teasing evident in his tone.

  Oh for Pete’s sake. She was going to murder Amy for using that tired old line about her sinful buns. This guy struck her as a man who in no way needed any help in the flirtatious come-on category. Balls.

  Rolling her eyes, she looked back at Amy and glared at her for good measure. The smug look of I told you so on the other woman’s face made her jaw clench. Waving her over it took only seconds for the assistant to glide across the room.

  “What can I get you guys?” she asked innocently while completely ignoring the warning in Brynn’s eyes.

  “Bring out some cinnamon bites, Amy. Mr. Merrill and I will be over by the window. I’ll grab the coffee if you don’t mind showing him to the table.” And with that she whirled around and dashed to the coffee station hoping that the diversion would give her the chance to get her shit together. It didn’t help at all when she turned back with two mugs of coffee in her hands and found Amy unabashedly flirting with Jax Merrill. And as if that wasn’t enough to get her teeth grinding, he’d removed his jacket to reveal a plain black t-shirt stretched tight across his chest that framed his muscular arms to perfection.

  Brynn couldn’t believe the way she was reacting. What the hell was wrong with her? She certainly wasn’t immune to the occasional panty-dampening response to a good-looking guy, but she wasn’t a giggly teenager anymore and had long ago learned to dial back the distracting impulses of her sex drive. This just wouldn’t do. Whatever this was.

  ODDLY GRATEFUL FOR AMY’S FLIRTATIOUS manner, Jax sat back in his chair and rested his forearms on the table while she prattled on. He was fighting a mighty internal battle to rein in his response to the snotty baker with a tremendous chip on her shoulder who was working overtime trying to dismiss him. He needed a few moments to get his bearings before she came back.

  The owner of the business, the person he’d been sent to meet with about some renovation projects, wasn’t anything at all what he expected. His first and most obvious what the fuck moment happened when he came face to face with a woman when he’d been expecting a man. Should have been a minor adjustment for him to get up to speed but dammit if Brynn Baron-Wilde hadn’t completely scattered his brain with just the sound of her voice. When she’d come up behind him, something that always managed to upset his Chi, before he even saw her, the gentle huskiness as she spoke latched onto his senses with a surge of awareness that rendered him, well…rendered him a complete fucking idiot.

  He might look as though he was enjoying Amy’s babbling, but Jax was actually cringing on the inside at the knowledge that he’d gone from tongue-tied and wide-eyed to whatever dumb-as-fuck thing he’d said about Brynn not being a man. He caught her instant reaction—the frozen withdrawal—and he felt like a dick. What in the fuck was wrong with him? Had his dad mentioned he’d be meeting with a woman? He couldn’t remember.

  And that was when he saw the chip she carried. She tightened up so fast at his clumsy comment that it was a wonder she didn’t crack in two. It didn’t require a rocket sc
ientist to recognize that she’d obviously been jacked up and fucked over at some point in her life, probably by some self-centered douche who’d been threatened by such a strong, capable woman. She had a don’t fuck with me vibe that let him know he wasn’t far off the mark.

  He saw her turn toward them as she made her way across the room and quite literally, whatever nonsense Amy was spewing just ceased to sound in his head. All he could hear was the sound of his heart thumping and the hitch in his breath when she looked at him.

  There was no fucking way he was threatened by Brynn Wilde. Far from it. She flashed fire and ice and made his gut feel like he’d been sucker punched. Plus, she wore a pair of jeans like nobody’s business. Holy shit but she was sexy as hell. Part of her allure was definitely that she wasn’t some twenty-two-year-old still trying to figure out who she was. He liked the grown-up appeal of a woman who knew where the hell her boundaries were.

  But those jeans, fucking amazing. She had long legs like a colt and even moved with a brisk clip as if being still was a challenge for her. The way the material clung to her curves as she came toward him showcased shapely thighs and a perfect ass that would be fun as shit to spank. And spanking the ice out of her until all that was left was her fire would be like a gift from the gods.

  By the time she reached the table and Amy had stopped talking, Jax was actively trying to get the sudden burst of arousal under some fucking control. He was here on business and while the idea of taming this Wilde woman’s fire seemed like a challenge he’d eagerly accept, she didn’t seem all that receptive.

  She plunked a big steaming mug of pungent coffee in front of him after sending her assistant scurrying away. He almost laughed at the stern look of reproach she’d flashed at poor Amy. The lady might not be all that captivated by his dubious charms, but she sure as shit wasn’t going to tolerate her assistant getting all giggly.